


A New Center

by amerande



Series: Rumbelle Showdown 1 [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Depression, F/M, severe depression cw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-19
Updated: 2014-09-19
Packaged: 2018-02-17 23:20:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2326847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amerande/pseuds/amerande
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rumplestiltskin deals with the emotional aftermath of loss. </p>
<p>((Major character death warning is because this deals with -- but does not show -- Baelfire's death.)) </p>
<p>My entry (as Bast) for round 2 of the Rumbelle Showdown. Super late in getting it to AO3 because I'm a bad. <br/>Prompts: Neverland's mother Belle, Perhaps, Bad Moon Rising</p>
            </blockquote>





	A New Center

It was hard to believe he'd ever found Neverland's jungle welcoming and beautiful. Now, with a bad moon rising to glow sullenly over the canopy, with all his senses on alert for danger, and with the sure knowledge that somewhere his grandson was being held captive or worse, Rumplestiltskin could find in himself nothing but contempt and disgust for the land and all its inhabitants.

Someone, likely a Lost Boy set on guard duty, was in the next clearing. Rumplestiltskin crept forward, bringing his magic to the ready – and felt it all rush away in his surprise at the site that greeted him when he passed the last barrier of trees.

“Belle, sweetheart,” he called in confusion. “However did you get here? You must leave. Please Belle, Neverland isn't safe.”

“It's perfectly safe now, Rumple,” she replied as she stood up from the fallen log she'd been seated on. “I came to find you! I had to tell you that we found him.”

“Him? Belle, who are you talking about?” He walked closer to her, a wild hope beginning to stir in the darkest corner in his heart.A

“He's here in Neverland, Rumple, but he doesn't have to be a Lost Boy anymore. We can be happy, be a family here – you and me and Baelfire –”

He woke up screaming, howling in inarticulate agony and rage.

 

‡

Baelfire was not lost. Not lost,  _dead_ .

Even as he recognized the nightmare for what it was, Belle – the real Belle, his beautiful, constant love – was there. She wrapped her arms around him as his shouts gave way to sobs that wracked his whole body. She murmured soft reassurances, told him he was going to be okay, that she was there, he was safe, it was going to be alright. She anchored him, grounded him, and brought him back to himself.

Pan's shadow still haunted his dreams as it had haunted him in Neverland. It came to him in Belle's form, spoke to him with Belle's voice, but it no longer urged him to return to Storybrooke. Instead, it promised him the only thing he could remember ever truly wanting: Baelfire, alive and safe. A true family, one that was bound together by love and nothing else.

Night upon night, he awoke from the nightmares. Even in his sleep he could not hide from the emptiness following Baelfire's death. Some nights he was silent in his heartbreak and tried to let Belle sleep. The gods only knew how tiring it must be for her, losing sleep to tend to the fears of a man grown, a man who should know better than to be ruled by his dreams.

All the same, Rumplestiltskin was loathe to resort to magic to stop the dreams. For just one perfect moment each night, his sleeping self could feel that impossible hope. Despite the agony that followed, he treasured the feeling of that one instant of rising joy.

‡

Belle was there in the middle of the night when he needed her most. When he was lost in thought and memory, she dealt with customers at the shop so he didn't have to. If he wished for space, she gave it. When he needed her company, it was his without reservation. She was understanding when he didn't want intimacy and generous when he did. She was beside him every step of the way as he tried to find a way past the gaping chasm in his life where Bae had always been. Days and weeks and months went on, and bit by bit the nightmares faded and he learned again what a deep delight it was to hear Belle's laughter and to share his life with her anew.

 

The world was whirling and whirling until its gyrations slowed and settled, little by little, on a new foundation, on Belle and her steadfast love.

‡

“Rumplestiltskin,” Belle said as she entered her study, hands clasped behind her back, “Can we talk?”

“Of course, sweetheart.” He laid down his pen and turned to her.

“I – I'm not sure how to tell you about this,” she said. As she drew near him, she looked around in apparent agitation.

After a moment, she glanced up and Rumplestiltskin saw tears in her eyes. Blind panic gripped his heart. Belle was so much of his strength, and her tears terrified him. He reached one hand out to her, seeking the reassurance of her touch.

“Belle, what is it? You can tell me anything, you know that.”

She knelt before him, taking his hand in one of her own and guiding it to cup her cheek. She looked up at him and offered a brave smile that warmed his heart.

“Rumple, I think we're going to have a child.”

His breath left him all at once, and Rumplestiltskin found himself distinctly grateful that he was already seated, or else he surely would have fallen.  _A child._

He worked his way around that thought gingerly, probing at it the way a recovering man might test a wound to see how tender it was.

The soul-deep ache for Baelfire was still there, but it was not a raw and ugly thing as it had once been. There was a sweetness to it now, and he could think of this new child without feeling like he as betraying Bae – and more importantly, he found genuine joy at the prospect of sharing parenthood with Belle.

He would never stop missing Bae; he knew that. But perhaps always missing him wasn't quite the same thing as never healing or moving on. When he had first lost his son through the portal between worlds, Rumplestiltskin had thought that to let himself love anyone or anything would be to undermine his promise to find Baelfire, but perhaps he knew better now. To keep himself from Belle and their child would be a waste of the life that Bae had bought for him.

He reached out his other hand to Belle and stroked her glorious hair. He searched her eyes and saw no recrimination, no resentment that he had not immediately expressed excitement.

“Belle, that's wonderful,” he whispered, and he moved to sit near her on the floor. He cradled her to him and felt his own tears falling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
